Acknowledgements
Special thanks to Hannah Welton who assisted with the research and checking on a number of maps, and to the team at Myriad – editors Jannet King, Candida Lacey and Sadie Mayne, and designers Isabelle Lewis and Corinne Pearlman – for their encouragement and dedicated work. We wish to extend our thanks also to Stephen Robinson for advice and help with the statistical compilation of the data, to Victoria Finlay for comments and insights, and to many colleagues in ARC whose reports, thoughts and reflections over the last couple of years have helped to shape our understanding of the world and its faiths, in particular, Tara Lewis, John Smith, Mike Shackleton, Guido Verboom, Paola Triolo and Dr He Xiaoxin. Above all, our gratitude to David B Barrett, whose knowledge, experience, detailed research and generosity of spirit have made this book possible. Joanne O’Brien Martin Palmer Photo Credits The publishers are grateful to the following for permission to reproduce their photographs: CIRCA RELIGION Photo Library www.circalibrary.com 12: Lotus, William Holtby; 20: Hindu guru, Bip Mistry; 22–23: March for Jesus, Washington DC, Martin Palmer; Orthodox Christians, Mike Edwards; 24–25: Mosque in Pakistan, William Holtby; Muslims at prayer, William Holtby; 26–27: Ganesha, Bip Mistry; Brother and sister, Bip Mistry; Shrine, Bip Mistry; 28–29: Nuns in pink robes, William Holtby; Buddhist monks, William Holtby; 30–31: Prayer at Western Wall, Barrie Searle; Torah scrolls, Mike Edwards; 32–33: Guru Nanak, Twin Studio; Reading the Guru Granth Sahib, John Smith; 34–35: Siberian Shaman, Maxim Shaposhnikov; Tayakh, Maxim Shaposhnikov; 36–37: Stained glass window, John Fryer; 44: Muslim women, William Holtby; 54–55: Open Bible, Mike Edwards; Painted Ethiopian Bible, John Smith; 56–57: Chinese Church, Tjalling Halbertsma; Turkey, John Smith; 60–61: Iran, William Holtby; 62: Jerusalem soldiers, Zbigniew Kosc; 64–65: Jerusalem gate, Zbigniew Kosc; 68: March for Jesus, Martin Palmer; 74–75: Brazil, Benedictine Community of Serra Clara, Itajuba; Cambodia, Association of Buddhism for the Environment, Cambodia; 76–77: Pakistan Market, William Holtby; 80: Hanging Temple, Tjalling Halbertsma; 82–83: Guru Nanak, Twin Studio; Lao Zi, Tjalling Halbertsma; Bodhidharma, Martin Palmer; 86–87: Mount Tai Shan, Tjalling Halbertsma; 90: Buddhist monk, Bip Mistry www.iStockphoto.com 34–35: Inukshuk, Shaun Lowe/iStockphoto; 60–61: Grand Mosque, Casablanca, Morocco, Michel de Nijs/iStockphoto; Djenne Mosque, Mali, Bytestrolch/iStockphoto; 82–83: Salt Lake City Temple, Utah, USA, Peter Chen/iStockphoto; St Peter’s, Rome, Italy, Ricardo Garza/iStockphoto; St Sofia’s Cathedral, Kiev, Ukraine, Vassili Koretski/iStockphoto; Golden Temple, Kyoto, Japan, pixonaut/iStockphoto; 86–87: Kootenay National Park, BC, Canada, Ulrike Hammerich/iStockphoto; Wupatki National Monument, Arizona, USA, Jason Cheever/iStockphoto; 87: Meteora Rousanou, Greece, Ben van der Zee/iStockphoto; St Catherine’s Monastery, Sinai, Egypt, Vladimir Pomortsev/iStockphoto; Mount Kinabulu, Borneo, Malaysia, Wei Yee Koay/iStockphoto Other sources: 70–71: Council for a Parliament of the World’s Religions, Steve Rohrbach; 74–75: Mexico, Pro-Natura-Chiapas; Eco-coffins, Working for Water’s Invasive Alien Species Programme, South Africa.
It was a fond hope of many secular ideologies in the last 100 years that ‘religion will wither and die’ in the light of social and technological advancements. From marxism to fascism, the expectation was that religion would be thrown aside as an emotional and intellectual prop that was no longer needed. This expectation was largely turned on its head during the last 20 years, and continues to be so. Instead, it has tended to be the ideologies that have faded, not the religions. In this new edition of the atlas, first published in 1993, we have a whole map that records this. ‘Emerging from Persecution’ (pp 66–67) charts the unprecedented levels of persecution against all major religions that has taken place since the beginning of the 20th century. More religious buildings have been damaged or destroyed, and more people have been killed for their religion during this period than in any previous century. Yet religious communities have recovered and are, in many, cases as numerous as before. Whether it is Daoists in China – almost wiped out during the Cultural Revolution of 1966 to 1974, the Tibetan Buddhists – persecuted by communism from 1949 to the present day, or Russian Orthodox Christians – attacked from 1917 until the 1980s, religion has not withered and in part, the need for an atlas such as this reflects that fact. Religious communities have also, on occasion, proved more sustainable than nation states. For example, when Zambia gained independence in 1964, the schools, colleges and health networks of hospitals and clinics run by the churches and the mosques were nationalized. The failure of the Zambian state has meant that many of these, often in a state of physical and economic collapse, have been handed back to the churches and mosques to run again, as we show in the map ‘Shared World’ (pp 70–71). The flip-side of the return or rise of the role of religion has been a growth in religiously inspired violence. While it is true to say that the majority of the last 100 years saw secular ideologies attacking religions, today that has been replaced by religions attacking secular societies, or waging war on other religious communities and identities. The recent rise of terrorists claiming to act in the name of Islam, the resurgence of religious conflict in a previously stable and multi-faith Indonesia, or the role of militant Buddhism in Sri Lanka’s long running civil war underlines why we all need to know and understand more about the religious nature of the world today. The re-emergence of old antagonisms, rooted in history, has led
Introduction
us to create another new map in this revised edition. The map on ‘Faultlines’ (pp 64–65) highlights the deep and ancient faultlines that run across parts of the world, and which have their origins in religious tensions. The violence of the ‘civil war’ in Iraq between Sunni and Shi’a has its roots in conflicts going back to the 7th century, and the opposition by much of ‘Christian’ Europe to the entry of ‘Islamic’ Turkey goes back to the 14th century. The business of religion is also covered here. The dramatic growth in Islamic banking and in ethical investment movements within the religions is recorded – something the wider world has yet to truly awaken to. Likewise, the sheer scale of religious funding and support of those suffering from HIV/AIDS, and the level of development funding from Islam and Christianity are things the world rarely acknowledges. The heart of the atlas remains the fascinating story of what the major religions in the world are, where they are today and how much power they have. The story of which religion is predominant in a given country is told both through numbers in the map ‘Popular Religions’ (pp 14–15) and in the three supporting maps, ‘Arrivals’ (pp 16–17), ‘Roots and Branches’ (pp 18–19) and ‘Origins’ (pp 82–83). These help to fill out a picture of the overall range and spread of faiths culturally, geographically and historically. Supporting this are the maps of specific religions, which introduce us to a shifting and changing religious world – be that Sikhs in the USA, the recovery of Buddhism